


Exhaustion

by as_with_a_sunbeam



Category: 18th Century CE RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: 1794, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Stress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 22:57:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10581234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/as_with_a_sunbeam/pseuds/as_with_a_sunbeam
Summary: In the early months of 1794, a Congressional investigation is pushing Hamilton to the limits of his endurance. Besieged, betrayed, and abandoned, he turns to his wife for comfort.





	

A persistent throb had started behind Hamilton’s right eye several hours ago and seemed now to only grow in severity. The coach clattered along towards his house, the squeaky wheels and pounding horse hooves loud in the otherwise dark and deserted Philadelphia street. The late hour and the cold of the early spring night had left the whole city quiet. He held his hand to his aching temple and closed his eyes for the duration of the journey.

His house was as dark and quiet as all the others on Market street as he disembarked the coach and made his way up the steps to his door. One lamp was still lit in the entryway, the fire in the empty parlor burning low. Eliza must have gone to bed already, he realized. He fought down his disappointment; he could have used her counsel and good company tonight.

He shrugged off his greatcoat and deposited his case in his dark office, not bothering to light a candle. The headache was becoming intolerable. The thought of sitting down to work made him feel ill. He’d get up early in the morning instead, he promised himself.

The children’s rooms were all dark as he passed along the upstairs hallway. His bedroom, however, was aglow with warm candle light and a crackling fire. He smiled weakly as he eased the door closed behind him. Eliza’s head was tilted back against the headboard, a book open in her lap. Clearly she had been trying to wait up for him. He’d have to find a way to ease her into a more comfortable position without waking her.

He stepped into the dressing room to change for bed. He was so utterly exhausted. The Congressional investigation into his conduct as Treasury Secretary had been going on for almost four months, now. He’d invited it; in fact, he’d specifically _requested_ it, to put an end to the slanderous talk that he’d abused his office. When he’d sent the request to Speaker Muhlenberg at the end of December, he’d expected a rigorous investigation to follow, but he’d never imagined anything quite like this.

Within a month, he’d been inundated with demands for stack after stack of treasury documents and petitions for long written explanations of complicated transactions. Despite his still shaky health, fighting the last vestiges of his near deadly fever, he’d met each new demand to the best of his ability. Then the hearings had started. Endless hearings, every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday for the last month and a half. They demanded his testimony at almost every session. When he wasn’t testifying, he was tracking down information on all aspects of his life during his time at Treasury, including detailed transaction summaries for all his personal bank accounts.

All this, he’d managed. It would all be over soon, he’d tell himself, time and again. He’d clear his name, and then he could resign. He could handle whatever the Jeffersonians threw at him until then, he convinced himself. At least, he had, until today.

Until that terrible, terrible letter.

A copy was still in his pocket, slightly crinkled from being hastily shoved there as he was leaving the office tonight. He couldn’t bring himself to look at it again, though the words were stamped in his memory. The feeling of deep betrayal rose up again, cutting and painful. His whole body was trembling with the force of the emotion, his hands shaking so badly he had difficulty undressing.

“Honey?” Eliza’s voice floated in to him, sweet as a siren song in the midst of a storm.

“In here,” he called out weakly. “I’ll…I’ll be just a minute.”

He rushed to pull on his nightshirt, then blew out a harsh breath, willing the trembling to stop. He forced a smile onto his face and re-entered the bedroom.

Eliza was sitting up fully now, her book closed and laying on the bedside table.

“I’m sorry I was so late again,” he apologized.

She shook her head. “It’s all right, sweetheart. I know how busy you are right now. Do you have to go back in the morning?”

He nodded.

“Well, you’d best get some sleep, my love,” she said, patting the bed in invitation. As he moved towards her, she craned her neck, and asked, “What’s that?”

“What?” he replied, stopping short of the bed.

“That paper in your hand,” she clarified.

His gaze snapped down. He had the letter clenched in his fist. He hadn’t even realized he was still holding it.

“It’s…it’s a letter.”

“A letter?” she echoed, brow furrowing.

“From President Washington,” he added.

“Why are you crushing it in your hand?” she asked.

He hesitated, then climbed into the bed and held it out for her to read. She smoothed the paper out against her legs, her eyes darting over the words. When she’d finished, she looked back at him, confused.

“I asked him to write a letter to confirm my testimony. That…” he trailed off, voice hitching embarrassingly. He swallowed and pointed at the document in his wife’s hands, “That was what he sent me.”

Eliza stared back down at the letter.

“ _Sir_ ,” the letter began, a cold and distant salutation, “ _I cannot charge my memory with all the particulars, which have passed between us, relative to the disposition of the money borrowed._ ”* It didn’t improve from there.

Eliza shook her head. “I don’t understand,” she whispered. “Why would he do this? Why would he try to distance himself from you?”

That was exactly what Washington was doing, Hamilton thought. He was distancing himself. As though he was worried that Hamilton’s actions would somehow taint him. As though he believed, along with everyone else in this Godforsaken country, that Hamilton had done something wrong.

Hamilton shrugged in response, his eyes burning suddenly. Washington had always been the one person—the one person—who believed in him. That had been his one consolation through all the mudslinging and backstabbing that passed for politics in this new nation. He hadn’t really realized it until he’d read that letter, but somewhere deep down, he’d truly believed that Washington would always stand by him, always shield him from the worst of the opposition’s vitriol. Now, his faith in his great General was shaken.

“Oh, honey,” Eliza sighed, wrapping him in an embrace.

“I’m so tired, Betsey,” he whimpered, hot tears leaking out as he rested his head on her shoulder. “I’m just so tired.”

“I know,” she cooed, squeezing him gently. “It’s all right.”

He shook his head. Nothing was all right. “I hate this.”

“I know,” she repeated.

“I feel so alone.”

He was alone, utterly abandoned by everyone he’d once thought a friend or confidant. There was no one left he truly trusted, no ally to which he could turn.  His memory suddenly flashed to the end of the war, when the country had been new and full of promise. He’d had such faith, back then.

Of course, he hadn’t thought he’d be doing this alone. Laurens was supposed to help him. Together, hand in hand, they were going to build their new nation. They would have forged a  strong alliance between the North and the South. Laurens would have been an implacable foe to the likes of Jefferson and Madison. Laurens would have stood by him through everything.

A high, keening sound emanated from him as a sob ripped its way out of his chest. “It’s not fair,” he cried, clutching at his wife desperately. “I wasn’t supposed to have to do this alone.”

Eliza rubbed his back firmly.

“Why did he have to die?”

One of Eliza’s hands ran through his hair. “I don’t know, honey,” she answered. She seemed to know who he was thinking of, although he’d given her no indication.

He sucked in a breath and tried to calm himself down. He pulled away from Eliza slowly, sniffling, and wiped his hands over his eyes. His face felt hot. He was sure he’d gone red and blotchy from crying. His head ached worse than ever, his stomach now a little queasy from the incessant pounding, made worse by his emotional outpouring.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Eliza’s eyes looked damp, and she shook her head. “Don’t be sorry,” she said, leaning over to kiss him chastely. “And you’re not alone, honey.”

He nodded a little.

“I know I can’t help you with everything you’re going through right now, not the way John could have. But I’m here for you. I’m on your side. Always,” she assured him.

He started choking up again. “I love you,” he whispered. “I love you so much, Betsey.”

She hushed him gently and said, “I know, sweetheart. I love you, too.” Her cool hand stroked his cheek.

“I…I don’t feel well,” he confessed plaintively.

Her expression was soft and tender as she suggested, “Why don’t you lie down? You need to sleep. Come on.” She blew out the candle and then guided him down towards the pillows. He curled up against her, his nose buried in her hair as he clutched at her.

“Everything’s going to be all right,” she whispered to him, her hand stroking up and down his back. “Just sleep. Everything is all right.”

He let himself believe her as he surrendered at last to his exhaustion.

**Author's Note:**

> *To Alexander Hamilton from George Washington, 8 April 1794. 
> 
> And now for my rambling history note: Ham really did invite Congress to do a full investigation of him to settle any lingering doubts from a previous investigation that had been conducted earlier, spearheaded by William Branch Giles. Still in ill-health from having Yellow Fever the previous fall, Ham struggled from Congress's near harassment through the next spring (in fact, at one point he wrote a letter to John Adams, as President of the senate, pleading for help, which he didn't receive). In May, Congress finally issued a report stating that they had found no hint of wrong-doing on the part of the secretary. 
> 
> The letter from Washington in the midst of all this seems to have been a particularly hard blow. Congress was giving Ham a particularly hard time about his use of foreign loans, as he wasn't always careful to tie the transactions to explicit permission from Congress. Ham claimed he derived his authority from verbal instructions by the President. When he wrote to Washington asking for him to confirm his claim, Washington sent him the letter cited above, which was distant and underwhelming in it's support. Madison called the letter "humiliating." (Ron Chernow, Hamilton, pp. 455-56)
> 
> Last, regarding John Laurens, I find his death to be so heartbreaking and tragic. Had Laurens lived, he would have been a strong ally for Ham in the South, something he sorely needed. Laurens' death presents one of the great what-if's of history, in my opinion. I imagine his absence would have been most keenly felt by Ham during periods like this.


End file.
